Gear: New World

Secrets. We all Have Them.

 He tore through his chicken wings as I gobbled up the remaining Chinese food. Soon after finishing, we made our way through his house to the back. Walking through, I noticed that he doesn't have any family photos or anything showing pictures of his past. The only real things he had in his house were couches, a TV, his bed, and essentials.

We made our way to the backyard, and the first thing I noticed was the number of bright lights lit up around the perimeter of the yard. He had lights strung up above the yard and lights almost anywhere he could put them, among tons of training equipment and what looked like practice dummies that had been marked up with knife attacks.

"Alright, you saw my Gear, LightSpeed. As I mentioned before, Gears are personalized, meaning your Gears are based on your personality. Before we get to your Gear, the most important part about all of this is knowing other people's Gear's."

"Why is that, I mean won't you see what their Gear's are when you fight them and stuff?"

"Yes, but what if you can't SEE their Gear, like mine, it's not an external effect that allows people to see me, you can't see super speed. Besides, if you're able to read a person's personality, then you'll know how to combat them and how to go about a fight in your favor."

"So then like the guy who attacked me, Murdock, his personality seemed to be on the creepy side, borderline stalker. So his Gear would be something dark or creepy right?"

For the first time since I've gotten to know him, Cain looked at me with an ever so slight smile of satisfaction.

"Yes, that's correct. Murdock's Gear is Shadow Manipulation. It allows him to control the shadows that are around him, and use them to cloak himself. He can even go into a shadow and transport himself to places."

"So then, if that's Murdock's, what would yours be? You seem like an impatient guy, and with the lack of family photos or even anything about the past, you seem like you're running from something, maybe trying to forget what happened in the past."

Once again, Cain looked at me with satisfaction, as if his 'skillful' teaching had finally paid off.

"You can say that, more like I don't like standing still, things bore me easily and I try to find a way to preoccupy myself, as you can see" as he guides his hand around as to display all the practice dummies and exercise equipment in his yard.

"I'm quite surprised you're so good at reading people though, would've never pegged you as someone smart like that. Big brawns idiot sure, but not smart."

"Trust me, I've always been like this, how do you think I got so good at playing cornerback? You gotta be able to anticipate what the receiver will do, and what the quarterback will do. It's all a process, one that I'm the best there is at."

"Well good for you on that, but you'll see once you start fighting people, it's not as easy as you think. For now, though, let's focus on what you've been wanting so much. Your Gears."

"YES! Finally, get to do something awesome-" As I finished my sentence, his fist connected with my jaw this time and I swear I heard a slight crack on the impact.

"What was that for!?"

"That was sounding like an idiot. This is not some fantasy or fairytale where you get all these powers and get to go on your merry way. Murdock was only the surface of the problems you're going to go through. If you keep acting like this, you're gonna get killed."

Rubbing my jaw, making sure nothing's broken I reply "okay okay, so how do we start?"

"You need to concentrate on the flow of your energy. Gear Shift is an ability in which one's energy flow changes from passive to active, which is how we use our abilities. Focus solely on yourself, disregarding the outside distractions."